COMPANY

After 92 continuous quarters (23 years) of financial loss, Hydron Technologies boasts that its $1.3 million second-quarter profit is the beginning of an international expansion into the skin care industry.

The Boca Raton company's first-ever profit, announced on Tuesday at the annual shareholders meeting, is a result of Hydron's partnership with QVC, the cable shopping network. This year, Hydron has sold more than $4 million worth of its skin lotions exclusively through QVC.

"For over 15 years, our investors have supported our extensive research and development program. As a result, we now have a profitable company," Hydron President Harvey Tauman said.

"We think that we have an opportunity here to be a major, major company," Tauman told shareholders at the Crocker Marriott in Boca Raton. "I think you're going to see these products in every corner of the world."

Hydron's line of skin care products, called Best Defense by Hydron, were made available to the public last year.

Tauman said Hydron will be retailing goods internationally through infomercials and expects to be in U.S. stores within a year. The company said it also has signed contracts to sell in foreign markets, including Scandinavia, China and Australia.

Best Defense products contain Hydron, a moisture-attracting group of polymers commonly used in contact lenses. Hydron Technologies never reported profits until Tuesday because it had invested more than $11 million researching Hydron since the company went public in 1971.

Hydron Technologies was originally founded in 1948 as Oral Craft, later called Dento-Med Industries. At that time, the company sold professional dental products. The corporation has been based in Boca Raton for nine years and changed its name to Hydron Technologies in July 1993.

Tauman, who has spent his entire career with the company, said profits were inevitable.

"It has been very, very hard. My family really paid the price ... but I kept our eyes on the light at the end of the tunnel. And I said, 'because I know we're right, I will never let anything derail us.'" Shareholders have supported the company.

"I always felt that they had it, that it was a good product, that they had the management ... and they knew to wait for when the time is right," said John Evans, 50, of West Palm Beach, who owns 10,000 shares. He said he uses the products.

"I have my hands in clay every day. I am a potter. Clay dries your hands," he said. "Every potter in the U.S. has been searching for something like this."

Demetrius Triadis, an investor from Greece, said he expects expanding profits for the company. But he is skeptical of the firm becoming the multibillion-dollar producer that Tauman expects.

"Theoretically, it's possible, but it's once in a lifetime," he said. "Now is a nasty time in the market, you make one mistake and you're done for."

Triadis read of the product in the newspaper while on a trip to Florida.

Challenges ahead for Hydron will be to keep up with the sudden rise in demand and successfully entering international markets, shareholders and company officials said.

The company's manufacturing is done in New Jersey.

"We have a great opportunity here," Tauman said to stockholders. "We'll try not to make big mistakes."

Tauman has appeared periodically on QVC to tout Hydron's skin lotions. On July 1, Tauman's appearance on the network spurred $2.1 million in sales. It was the largest amount of sales in one day ever on QVC, network officials said.

Kathy Levine, 42, a QVC host, touts the products alongside Tauman on the network shows. She said the products have moistened her skin to the point that viewers have written her with compliments on a face lift she never received.